That time Sparklejet made a record with Steve Albini. A remembrence

Plus, new music from Blake Jones and the Trike Shop and Matt Davis joins NewRock 104.1 with the 120 Buzz.

Joshua Tehee

May 12, 2024

There’s a joke I heard about the passing of Elvis Presley.

It goes: “Knock knock.”

“Who’s there?”

“Elvis.”

“Elvis, who?”

“How soon they forget.”

It’s an admittedly dumb and tactless joke, but I’ve always liked it and among a certain set of friends, it’s become the shorthand for sharing news about the death of any celebrity. Just a quick text. “Knock, knock.”

There were no jokes with Steve Albini.

There were texts certainly on Tuesday morning, after learning of the death of the influential iconoclast recording engineer and indie-rock stalwart. He was 61. It was a heart attack.

The messages were mostly short and full of shock.

“OMG dude, no.”

“FUCK. Goddamn it.”

If you want to get a sense of Albini’s life and work, you can do a Google search. It’s been covered and pontificated upon by just about every music publication of note, plus majors news outlets like the New York Times.

As a recording engineer (he wasn’t a producer), Albini was a generational wonder who helped create some of the most influential albums in the indie rock catalog. He worked with the The Pixies, The Breeders, Fugazi (though the session was scrapped), PJ Harvey, Low and, mostly famously perhaps, Nirvana.

The proposal letter he wrote to the band in advance of recording “Utero” is a must-read. It is illuminating, in laying out Albin’s philosophical approach to recording and also more than a bit prescient to the current musical landscape, where every beat and note of recorded music can be (and often is) perfected out.

Sure, it sounds good and right, but it’s void of any artistic umph.

Work aside, Albini’s overt distain for the music industry and ability to verbalize the struggle of independent musicians as artists, endeared him to many.

It also made him accessible.

Even with major credits to his name and a musical career in his own right, Albini continued to work with unsigned bands at his Electrical Audio Recording studio in Chicago.

Sparklejet recorded the album “Beyond the Beyond” with Albini in 2004. In behind-the-scenes video footage recorded at the time, Albini can be seen in his signature blue jumpsuit.

“I was walking back into the control room, in Studio A at Electrical Audio studio, having adjusted some things on my guitar amp and I remember hearing a voice singing the horn parts to Archie Bell and the Drells’, ‘Tighten Up,’ ” Victor Sotelo wrote, remembering the sessions.

“Like, note for note … That voice was the sound of Steve Albini,” he wrote.

The band had made the trek from Fresno to Chicago, and on the way (in Cheyenne, Wyoming?) the song had come on the radio.

“So, of course (as musicians do), we talked to him about that moment,” Sotelo wrote.

Albini was a seminal figure in Sotelo’s early days as musician. He had absorbed much of Albini’s thoughts about recording and his perspective on music. It was a bond among band members.

“There we were, in the common area of Electrical Audio studio, playing whiffle ball, when Steve walked in and joined in the childish amusement by announcing, ‘Are you guys ready for The Puzzler?’. He then proceeded to baffle us with his puzzler pitch,” Sotelo wrote.

“He was a baseball fan (White Sox and NOT the Cubs) and, of course, a poker fan too. You could find him in the common area, after hours, watching poker matches that he had recorded to watch afterwards in the late (or early?) nights. And he was good at billiards. Not pool, but billiards. He would knock those red balls around like a pro.”

Steven Ordiano, who runs Studio Six Audio in Fresno, attended a Mix with the Masters Seminar with Albini just last month. He posted some photos of the seminar on Instagram, along with a few choice quotes from Albini.

“My parents were married in Madera.” Albini told something similar to the Sparkletjet members. It’s also confirmed in his official obituary, which calls his parents “high school sweethearts from the hardscrabble town of Madera.”
“I can make a record on a Mackie board and a tape machine.”
“I’ll have some rice or couscous…”

During the seminar Ordiano was able to share a track he recorded with the punk band Werebear for its upcoming album. Albini’s response to the work?

“I think this song could be really important to a group of people.”

For years, Sparklejet bassist Geoff Anderson, kept the initial phone message Albini left when he returned the call to talk arrangements for the session. Unfortunately, this was before cell phones and cloud backups and the message got erased in a power outage.

“It’s now lost to time and preserved in memory,” Sotelo wrote.

“The great Steve Albini is gone. RIP, Steve.”

You can check out Albini’s work with Sparklejet over on its Bancamp page, or hear a track from the album 8 p.m. tonight on the Homegrown show on NewRock 104.1.

Blake Jones and the Trike Shop teases new single, album for Big Stir Records

It’s been six year since Blake Jones and the Trike Shop released “Make,” the first vinyl release from the fledging record company Big Stir out of Los Angeles.

On Saturday, the label started teasing the band’s follow up, “and Still…,” which is slated for release in August.

The first single “Record Cover Girl,” drops on Friday across all digital platforms.

“Across the new record, Jones applies his talent for sharp hooks and lyrical wit to a set of short, bracing pop excursions with a palpable sense of time and place — frequently the aisles of a used record store, or Fresno itself,” the label wrote.

On “Record Cover Girl” it’s both.

The song takes inspiration from an album cover hung up at Tower District Records and an “almost haiku” left on a sticky note in the bathroom.

There is a video release for the song on Thursday and Jones and company performs Saturday at Gazebo Gardens.

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NewRock 104.1 debuts The 120 Buzz

NewRock 104.1 is working at appointment radio. That is, creating content you have to tune in to hear (even if it’s via digital streaming).

That station has loaded up the Sunday night lineup with a series of niche programing that includes the Homegrown Show (hosted by yours truly) and (as of 6 p.m. tonight) The 120 Buzz.

Hosted by Matt Davis, the program promises two hours of brand new music that falls on the spectrum of indie/alternative/post-punk and the like.

Davis had hosted “Left of the Dial,” on KFCF 88.1. That show will now hosted by DJ SBC Global, who runs the music blog site Tunes and Oats.

The 120 Buzz replaces Mike Oz’ Ozmosis radio show, which aired for a decade.